“Can’t. Too many people talking.”
He signaled for the others to leave. “Meeting in three hours,” he said, looking around. “Where are Sully and Heath?”
“Sully’s spending the night at his tree house. Heath’s somewhere in the complex,” Flyboy said, his eyes still on Elena. He didn’t look happy. “Are you okay, Hell?”
“Umm,” Elena replied.
Jed studied the little group around Hell. He reminded himself that they weren’t here to talk to him. Not counting T, who was Elena’s chief, in their own way, his men were worried and protective about the newest member of their group. They had all arrived here the moment they found out Elena was in danger.
“She’s fine, Hunter,” he said, reaching out to flick Elena’s hair out of her eyes. “She’s just done the equivalent of several somersaults in a fighter jet, that’s all. There were some anomalies but she did great.”
“If the meeting’s not absolutely urgent, at least five hours of total rest for you,” Dr. Kirkland said firmly. “Then you can have your meeting. Your body can only take so much, Jed. At least five hours and that’s the doctor’s orders.”
He had to be at the summit in three days. There was some time to rest up and prepare. Not much, but enough to afford taking a few hours to recharge himself.
“Go make your notes and rest up,” Alex said. “I’ll let you know if anything urgent comes through.”
Jed nodded. What he really wanted was to stay with Elena. She was peeking at them through her lashes, trying to stay awake. No, he would just be a distraction if he stayed. Knowing her, she wouldn’t want him around when she was vulnerable and would fight complete rest. He caressed her cheek again and felt the small quiver.
“Go to sleep. I’ll be in my quarters.” He turned abruptly, adding over his shoulder, “I’ll see you all in five hours.”
By the time he’d reached the elevators, he’d already started to compartmentalize his worries and feelings about Elena. He told himself she was more comfortable without him hanging around anyway. Now that he’d given himself five hours instead of three, he could take care of some other paperwork and a few calls, especially one to an oldfriend. First, though, he needed to make quick notes of all he’d seen. Outline the idea he had with targets and retrieval. He knew the others would have plenty of questions, some of which he wasn’t prepared to answer.
“FIVE HOURS? I THOUGHThe said three.”
“Old man needs his sleep.”
Eyes closed but still aware of the quiet conversation around her, Helen could hear them leaving the room. She made an effort to wave at the few who addressed her.
“Hey, see you later, Sleeping Beauty,” Flyboy said.
“Sweet dreams.” That was pure Armando.
“You’ll feel a little prick. We’re going to make sure everything is being monitored while you sleep,” Dr. Kirkland said.
Try as she could, she just couldn’t keep her eyes open. She was simply wiped out by the remote-viewing session. She hadn’t thought it possible to RV so many different locations, one after another. During her training, her instructors had told her that there had been previous experiments but most of the remote viewers had gotten confused about locations—going from one apparently distorted spatial awareness to another. After a while, there was also the weariness factor.
But none of them had a Hades to anchor them, she thought sleepily. None of them shared the remote-viewing session in such a way that one could monitor directly.
“Viva labrainwaves,” Helen murmured in self-mockery, then added, “I know you’re still here, T”
“Just making sure.”
T didn’t sound worried, but Helen knew that her spiked readings were serious enough to warrant the presence of so many commandos and her operations chief at her side. She was aware she had stopped breathing at one point.
“Got y’all scared, huh?” Helen said wryly. “I’m sorry, I can’t think at the moment. It was quite a session.”
“I know. Do you have anything to tell me before I leave?”
“Yeah. Make sure Jed tells you about the girl in the crate. I’m worried about her. I’ll feel guilty if they find her body because she’s alive right now.”
There was a pause. “Okay, I’ll do that.”
“T? Tell Dr. Kirkland to administer a dose of the serum if, in five hours, I can’t get up. I want to be able to make that meeting.”
“Hell—”
“It’s important that I’m with the team all the way, T. And it’s important I get the mission deets firsthand from Jed. I want to besitting there and be part of the operation and not just some crazy experiment they pull out of bed when it suits them.” She sighed. Seeing that other remote viewer all curled up had really gotten to her. “That came out bitter, didn’t it?”
